94 



APPENDIX 



^/ 



the flowers are used along with Akalber (^Dalisca cannahina) and alum 

 to dye silk, giving a sulphur -yellow colour known as gandha/ci\ and 

 that they are also used in calico-printing. Their price in the Punjab 

 is said to he Rs. 27*5 per cwt. This dye is alluded to by 

 Dr. McCann, and Mr. Wardle, but under the name of , 



Mr 



J 



The Hellebores of the Ancients.* 



Drugs prepared from hellebore were so famous amongst the an- 

 cients as a remedy for madness, and, indeed, for many other ailments, 

 that the plant has acquired for itself a literary as well as a botanical 

 interest. Pliny gives a list of them quite worth the notice of adver- 

 tisers of patent medicines. We know that different species have 

 been used in different countries for their medicinal properties, which 

 are, perhaps, essentially the same in all of them, though varying in 

 strength. The hellebore of the modern English Pharmacopoeia is the 

 root of HellehoTus niger^ the common Christmas Rose* In Germany, 

 H. viridisy the green hellebore, is said to be preferred, and from its 

 frequent occurrence in England in the neighbourhood of old ruins, 

 we may infer that it was formerly used here- At Constantinople a 

 popular drug, called Zoptane, is made from H. orientalis^ which is 

 common on the mountains of Eastern Turkey. In Gerard's time, our 

 native H.foetidusy the rankest of all the genus, was employed medi- 

 cinally, though known to require great caution in using, and it is 



still retained in veterinary practice for outward application. 



The physicians of ancient Greece, who for some centuries before 

 and after the Christian era were famous throughout the civilized 

 world for their skill, were very fanciful about the locality from which 

 the herbs used by them were collected. The kind of herb might be 

 the same, but when gathered on a particular mountain or in a parti- 

 cular forest it was thought to have additional virtue. Drugs of the 

 same name were classified as first, second, third or fourth quality. 



source 



trusted accordingly. Hellebore was of two kinds, distinguished as 

 black and white. The best black came from 



Mount Ilelicc 



I Mount Q^ta. The town most famous for its prepara- 



Anticyra, but this name was ambiguous. 



*From the Gardefiers" ChronicUj January 2. 



